Posted by Muzzer on 31/10/2016 10:14:38:
Hmm. My experience of Saabs was somewhat less impressive. I bought my dad's 9000 low pressure turbo automatic from him for £2k, did 2000 miles in in, blew up 2 engines and spent £2k on the resulting repairs. Advertised it for £1750, got £1850 cash and moved on. It would have been cheaper to have taken taxis everywhere at that cost per mile. Things came to a head when I found ourselves having to use a Shitroen ZX (non-turbo) diesel to go anywhere beyond the shops for fear of being stranded yet again with a detonated engine.
Nice cars but not quite Honda levels of reliability. My dad had about 5 of them and although they weren't as catastrophically bad as mine, he had problems like exhaust manifold failing (in Austria), head gasket failure, coolant hose bursting, engine cutting out etc on various of them. People say GM destroyed their reliability but I'm not so sure it was as simple as that.
I may have been lucky, but I have never suffered a saab breakdown, though I service my cars myself, change the oil every 5000 miles and only use good quality fluids and filters. Did over 100,000 miles in my 900, 80,00 in my 9-3, 45,000 in my 9000 and am hitting 35,000 in my 9-5.
My luck with other cars has not been so good, had a brand new vectra as a company car – regular ecu error faults, jeep cherokee – autobox failure, ford escort – gearbox failure at 10,000 miles from new, mini clubman – failed coolant hose to head, Will not go into detail with my Landrover Defender – in my 70,000 miles of ownership – front diff failure, gearbox failure, never mind multiple universal joints and wheel bearings, has always still got me home though and has been used for some serious offroading.